


paint my spirit gold

by Thighz



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Destiny is a Bitch, Explicit Sexual Content, Hurt/Comfort, Immortality, M/M, Modern Era, Repressed Memories, Temporary Character Death, but she means well, kinda slow burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-26
Updated: 2020-02-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:22:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22913170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thighz/pseuds/Thighz
Summary: The thing about being immortal is you’re never quite sure what the world will become in the next year or decade or millennia. The planet keeps on spinning and the monsters never cease, so Geralt stays steady on his Path.Or Geralt attempts to move on after a thousand years, but Destiny isn't having any of that shit.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 27
Kudos: 246





	paint my spirit gold

**Author's Note:**

> Is this going to make any sense? Probably not. But hey. Where's the fun in making any sense.
> 
> _Enjoy_

Jaskier dies on a rainy day in early spring.

“A travesty.” He mumbles, bundled up in a fur blanket and staring out a window overlooking Kaer Morhen’s mountain range, “I’m insulted.”

As much as it hurts to smile in the face of his best friend's mortality, Geralt manages one. He wraps a hand around the back of Jaskier’s neck, thumbing at the ends of grey hair. The heart beat beneath his fingers is slower, the skin still warm from a recent fever.

“You can always wait another day.” Geralt says.

Jaskier’s blue gaze moves away from the frosted window to look up at Geralt, “You and I both know better.”

Geralt resists the urge to rub away the cold spike of emotion that invades his chest. He leans down to press a kiss against Jaskier’s temple, breathing in the scent of wildflowers and lavender - and the acrid stench of death.

Jaskier hums and leans into the kiss, “I didn’t think you’d be so sentimental, Geralt.”

Geralt drags the kiss over the wrinkles of Jaskier’s cheekbones, to press against his mouth, “You and I both know better.”

Jaskier huffs a laugh, but it’s weak and is followed by a wheeze from deep within his chest.

Geralt tugs the blanket tighter around Jaskier’s shoulders. Then, he stokes the fire until he is sure it will chase the chill from the rain away. Jaskier is quiet, so unlike him and incredibly unnerving. He has spent decades filling the silence in Geralt’s wake. To know it will soon be gone forever feels like a dagger to the gut.

When he is done with the fire, Geralt retrieves Jaskier’s lute from where it is propped against a vanity mirror. He carries it to the chair by the window and sits with his back to Jaskier’s right hand.

His first few tries are shit. Geralt doesn’t know how to wield an instrument the way he wields a sword. But he knows that he will go crazy if he just sits and waits for the inevitable to happen.

Jaskier’s hand finds his shoulder, then tangles thin fingers in his hair. Those fingers trace letters against his scalp, voice too weak to say them aloud.

_ I love you _

Geralt strums for hours, as the rain beats against glass and Jaskier’s fingers twist and twine and tug.

The rain stops near dawn.

And Jaskier’s hand falls limp against Geralt’s shoulder. 

He takes a hold of it and presses his lips to an old, wrinkled wrist.

He curses destiny and mortality and his own traitorous heart.

Geralt holds on to both hand and lute until they are pried from him hours later. Gentle fingers press against his arms from both sides. The smell of fresh snow from the left and lilac from the right.

They don’t speak and he’s grateful for it.

The funeral is a quiet affair, another travesty. Jaskier’s funeral should be filled with song and dance and ale. Instead, it’s silent, because three immortals don’t know how to properly mourn the loss of their human friend.

Ciri lays a bundle of dandelions at the foot of his grave.

Geralt kneels in vigilance until they wilt and join the earth.

“What will you do now?” Yennefer asks.

“Continue on the Path.” Geralt rises, “As I’ve always done.”

  
  
  


***

  
  


The thing about being immortal is you’re never quite sure what the world will become in the next year or decade or millennia. The planet keeps on spinning and the monsters never cease, so Geralt stays steady on his Path.

As the years roll by, cities become larger, people begin to live longer.

There comes a day where riding a horse around the world doesn’t cut it. He can no longer carry his swords on his back in public.

The legend of the Witchers becomes naught but a fairy tale.

  
  
  


***

  
  


_ Present day _

If there was a better way to spend a Friday night other than sitting in the cab of a truck sharing a two day old honey bun with a dog, Geralt doesn’t know it. He peels off another section and feeds it to Roach, who gets icing all over her wet nose and flicks her tongue violently at it to devour all the artificial sugar.

He’s watching the back door of a local night club, hoping for a lead in the month long chase of a vampire coven. There’s freezing rain pelting at his windshield and he’s half hoping nothing comes out of the nightclub, if only to avoid the downpour.

Roach nuzzles at his hand, eyeballing the remainder of his honey bun.

Geralt sighs and hands it over, “All this sugar is going to make you fat.”

She leaves crumbs all over the seat of his truck and doesn’t seem to care one bit about gaining a lick of weight. Geralt leaves her to her mess and refocuses on watching the back door of the night club.

Geralt watches and waits well into the night. He watches as people stumble out for a smoke or to take out the trash. An ordinary Friday night in an ordinary part of an ordinary world that Geralt shouldn’t still be apart of.

_ “Adapt and overcome, Geralt, adapt and overcome. _ ”

He does his best to heed Yen’s advice. The new world suits her revoltingly well. She broke him down into getting a cell phone recently with the bait that it would keep him in contact with Ciri. It worked, damn her, because Ciri calls him on a near daily basis from whatever corner of the globe she’s trekking.

Modern marvels and all.

The world isn’t safer, per say, but it is safe enough that Geralt doesn’t fret at the distance between the three of them.

Geralt listens to the sound of the rain, drifting in and out of consciousness. He tries to remember the last time he slept for longer than a few hours. Or the last time he slept next to a warm body.

Surely, the last time hadn’t been -

_ In that pile of blankets and furs, a fire roaring in the hearth. Old, worn fingers drifting down the dip of his spine. A voice like honeycomb, even at the ripe age of 70, putting Geralt to sleep. The scent of lavender and wildflowers and cedar. _

_ Lavender _ -

Geralt jerks awake, Roach whines at him, ears alert and front paws on the dashboard.

Two figures are now outside in the rain, one shoved up against the brick wall, the other crowding them. The shapes are murky due to the deluge of water racing down his windshield, but even through a blasting heater Geralt can  _ smell _ lavender and fear.

He moves on instinct, reaching for the silver sword laid across the seat. Roach shifts in tandem, darting out the moment he pops the latch on the door and racing through the sludge. Geralt watches with proud fascination as she sinks her teeth into the strangers calf.

“Bloody buggering  _ fuck! _ ”

“Oh, whoa-ho those are some chompers on you!”

Geralt wraps a hand around the back of the attackers shirt and yanks him away.

Fangs white as the moon and long as daggers glisten under the fluorescent lights. The vampire hisses at Geralt before trying to lunge for his throat.

Geralt doesn’t let him get that far.

He swings his silver in a quick, swiping arc, decapitating the creature within seconds. The head hits a puddle and the body follows with a heavy splash of water and mud.

It brings the man against the wall into full view.

Blue -  _ blue _ eyes blink at him. Blue like oceans and cornflowers and -

“You cut his whole head off!”

Geralt grunts and shoves the body out of the way with his boot. Roach sniffs it and gives a satisfied huff of approval at its demise.

“I mean - thank you ever so much - I do believe I was about to become someone's late night dessert and  _ not _ in the good way -.”

“Jaskier.” Geralt sighs, bone tired and caught somewhere between disbelief and heartache. 

“Oh.” A smile, “Did you watch my show?”

Geralt squints.

Jaskier waves to the door, “My show? You called me by my stage name. Jaskier.”

“Stage name.” Geralt murmurs.

“Yes, I do prefer it to my birth one, which is Julian, if we’re to make acquaintances over a dead body.”

“Geralt.”

“Not a man of many words, are you, Geralt?” Jaskier crosses his arms over his chest, the pastel blue sweater he’s wearing soaked through with rainwater. Geralt can see the chattering of teeth and the rise of goose flesh along an exposed neckline.

“Sometimes silence is the better option.”

“Well, that’s no fun.” There’s a shiver in his tone.

Geralt reaches for the door to the club and pulls it open, “You’re freezing. Go inside.”

Jaskier-but-not-Jaskier eyes him for a moment, “Would you like to come in? I could buy you a drink as - ah - thanks?”

The warmth from within and from that familiar blue gaze is tempting, but Geralt turns his eyes down at the decapitated vampire water-logging in a puddle, “No thanks. Can’t leave it here.”

Disappointment smells like vinegar, but it’s washed away with the rain, “I hope there aren’t any more of those things in there.”

“Vampire.” Geralt mutters.

“ _ Vampire _ ? Here?” Jaskier exclaims, then cautiously, “ _ Are _ there more?”

Geralt doesn’t even know now. He cut off the head of his first lead. Because even after over a thousand years without Jaskier’s touch or his taste or his scent - Geralt still reacted as he always had.

“Maybe try to avoid going home with anyone tonight.” Geralt wipes the blood from his sword across the soaked material of his jeans. It’s starting to reek, especially as the intensity of the rain lessens.

“Can I go home with you?”

“No.” Geralt doesn’t intend for the word to come out so harshly, but it does. 

Jaskier flinches in the wake of it, but recovers with a chirping, “You seem to be the safer option as far as I’m concerned.” He motions to the sword in Geralt’s hand with a roguish grin.

Roach lets out an unhelpful bark. Geralt sends her a warning look.

“Go inside.” Geralt waves Jaskier towards the noisy inner sanctum of the club, “Forget you ever met me.”

He hates how the very idea of Jaskier disappearing in the throng of moving bodies makes his teeth hurt. That never seeing him again makes him want to claw out his own heart and eat it raw. But it’s better this way.

This Jaskier does not know Geralt or his reputation. He knows only where he came from and where he’s going now. It means Jaskier does not have to live decades of his life chasing after Geralt’s shadow before dying of a fever with nothing but a Witcher by his side and a sad grave hidden in a mountain fortress thousands of years gone.

Jaskier moves to stand inside the door frame, still close enough that Geralt would feel like a prick for letting the door slam shut on him. He’s watching Geralt with a familiar mixture of fascination and determination. Both of which Geralt loathed seeing the first time they met in a tavern in Posada.

“Go back to your performance.” Geralt says.

“It’s over and you didn’t watch it.” Jaskier lifts his chin, “So, how did you know my name?”

“Lucky guess.” Geralt puts a finger to Jaskier’s chest and pushes him the rest of the way inside the hallway.

“But-!” Geralt shoves the door closed in his face and holds it closed in case Jaskier decides to open it again.

His fist trembles against the rain-chilled knob. There are thorns in his throat and Roach softly whining and music thumping faster than the beat of his heart.

“Let’s go.” Geralt goes about moving the body into the locked bed of his truck. He can’t just leave it in the open, not like in the old continent. Now, there are investigations and messy politics and Geralt does not need the new world tracking him down.

He was barely paid back then and even less so now that no one knows what he is.

He whistles for Roach when he’s done. She’s still sitting at the back door, watching it like a hawk. He doesn’t have to see her face to know she’s miffed with him even from across the uneven, muddy parking lot.

“Come on, Roach.” Geralt growls.

She turns her nose up just a little more.

Geralt sighs, “He’s safer without us.”

She droops, ears lowering along with her snout. Geralt watches her trot back to him before hopping onto the seat, muddy paws and all.

Geralt grabs an old towel from behind one of his seats to lay out so they don’t stick to the worn leather. Roach turns twice before nestling in the passenger seat and tucking her head into her belly.

Geralt slips his silver sword behind the seat to join the steel one and settles in for a long night of berating himself. 

He should have been more careful. He should have interrogated instead of decapitating. He hates that one whiff of a long dead lovers scent spiraled him into forgetting his own training. Now, he has no lead to the coven and even less of a desire to go into the club to finish the investigation.

Roach snuffles in her sleep. Rain clicks against the glass of his windshield. Geralt can see the skyline threatening a brand new day behind the outline of the club itself.

He tips his head back against the seat, takes a deep breath, and grabs his cellphone from the cubby hole under his radio. He dials the number by heart and puts the speaker to his ear.

It rings four times before he receives a huffy, “Now this is a surprise.”

Geralt closes his eyes with a sigh, “Yen.”

“You call me at least once every decade.” She sniffs, “I can be shocked.”

“I called you three weeks ago about a potion.” Geralt grunts.

“A decade, three weeks, what’s the difference?” She replies flippantly, “Point is, you only ever call me if you need something.”

“I just wanted to know if you believed in reincarnation.”

Yen is quiet for a handful of seconds, before she whispers, “I always assumed  _ you _ did.”

Geralt furrows his brow, “Why?”

“Geralt.” She admonishes, “You name every companion ‘Roach’.”

“Habit.” He side eyes his sleeping German Shepherd.

“And they are always nauseatingly loyal to you and only you no matter what species they are.” She snorts.

“I’m good with animals.” Geralt mumbles.

Yennefer sighs in irritation, “For fucks sake Geralt what is the point of this?”

Geralt swallows thickly, “Yen.”

He hears her shift on the other end of the connection. Wherever she is, she’s sitting up a little straighter to listen. Geralt loves that about her. Frustrated as she is with him ninety percent of the time, she knows everything there is to know about him. Including his one word answers apparently.

“Geralt. What happened?”

“Fuck. It can’t be him.” Geralt hisses, “It’s not  _ possible _ .”

“Him?” Yennefer murmurs, confused for only a moment before inhaling sharply, “ _ Jaskier? _ ”

“It was dark and raining. I sent him back inside. I was probably seeing things.” Geralt reasons, “I shouldn’t have called.”

“Geralt.” Yen snaps, “What did he smell like? Look like?  _ Sound  _ like? I need details.”

“The same.” Geralt croaks, “The same as the day I met him.”

“Incredible.” She says in wonder, “Is he with you now? I can portal in to -.”

“ _ No _ .” Geralt snarls.

Yennefer clicks her tongue in warning once.

He swallows, clutches the phone tighter to his ear, “No.”

“And why the fuck not?”

“He’s safer this way.” Geralt replies.

“What a load of absolute shit.” She hangs up on him.

Geralt pulls the phone away and scowls at it before tossing it atop the dashboard. He leans forward, elbows resting inside the steering wheel. The phone doesn’t vibrate with her calling him back. Roach snores on, oblivious to his inner turmoil.

He lets out another bone weary sigh and reaches down to start up his truck. There’s a motel a few miles down the road and he wants dry clothes, a bed, and maybe a bottle of something strong to knock him the fuck out for the day. Then, he might get up and finish hunting vampires.

Geralt gets his fingers ready to twist the key in the ignition when someone knocks on the glass of his window.

He knows who it is before even turning his head.

“Fuck.” Geralt grumbles, twisting the key to start the engine, then pressing the button on the door to roll the window down part way, “Go back inside.”

Jaskier grins at him, soaked sweater switched out for a pink t-shirt and dark blue jacket. He has a guitar case on his back and a small pack over a shoulder, fingers curled around the strap.

“I know what you are.” He holds the grin steady.

Geralt lifts one eyebrow at him, “Is that so?”

“I mean - your methods are extraordinarily medieval, what with the sword and all, but I’ve been on the road long enough to know a  _ Hunter _ when I see one.” 

Geralt hums, “That what they call it now?”

“Is there another name for a roguishly handsome man who beheads vampires behind nightclubs?” Jaskier asks.

Geralt eyes him in silence, soaking in all of the similarities mirrored from a man who hasn’t existed in over a thousand years. Every little detail is exactly the same. The tousled brown hair that Geralt spent many an evening carding his fingers through, blue eyes that had never once looked at him in fear (Despair? Yes. Fear? Never.). He looks even younger than the Jaskier that found him in Posada.

“I don’t have the time to explain my job.” Geralt mutters, “Go back inside, Jaskier.”

“You say my name with such familiarity.” Jaskier props his forearm across Geralt’s window frame, fingers drumming to an unfamiliar tune, “Yet, we have never met.”

Geralt’s fingers curl tight around the steering wheel and he has to look away. Maybe if he ignores the musician long enough, he’ll just give up and leave.

_ Since when did ignoring Jaskier ever work _ ?

Geralt glances over at Roach, hoping she is still asleep and not witnessing his plight. He isn’t that lucky and her warm, brown gaze stares up at him with a wisdom even he doesn’t possess. He has to wonder how old she truly is. He wonders if Yen is right.

“You’re safer without me.” Geralt turns back to Jaskier.

“Am I?” Jaskier tilts his head, “I was nearly mauled by a saber tooth tiger this evening. Had you not been here, I would have become yet another casualty in a string of what I assume are enough murders to bring a-.” He waves his hand at Geralt.

“Witcher.” Geralt grinds out.

“To bring a  _ Witcher _ to this fine watering hole.” Jaskier finishes, then smiles again, “A Witcher? Really? What kind of a title is that?”

“A long dead one.” Geralt sighs, “I take jobs and kill monsters.”

“With swords?”

Geralt scowls at him, “I don’t have time to explain this to you.”

“Take me with you and we can make time.” Jaskier leans forward eagerly. He smells of rainwater and lavender and the lingering tang of booze. All familiar and taunting in their own way, reminding Geralt of what he’s gone so long without.

“No.”

“I’m a very mobile companion. I bounce from bar to bar, I usually travel by bus.” He wiggles his fingers, “I could provide extra funding for your - rather unknown - job.”

“No.”

Jaskier pouts momentarily before sliding a long look towards the locked bed of Geralt’s beat up truck, “What if the rest of them come back?”

Damn it.

Geralt lifts his gaze over Jaskier’s shoulder to stare at the back door of the club. It looks completely different in the coming dawn, but it is easy to tell there is blood mixed with the mud. There is no doubt the rest of the coven will know when one of their own hasn’t returned from a hunt.

“Fuck.” Geralt mutters.

“Excellent!” Jaskier beams and pushes away from the door. Geralt watches him practically skip around the front of his truck. He opens the passenger side and Roach pushes to her feet as he does, moving herself backwards into Geralt’s side.

“Traitor.” Geralt hisses at her.

Roach barks once as Jaskier climbs into the cab, settling his guitar between his legs. He reaches out a hand to her with a ready smile and zero fear, “Hello, beautiful girl.”

Roach whines happily as he rubs a hand between her ears and down the curve of her neck.

Geralt puts the truck in drive and pretends he isn’t jealous of his own damn dog.

  
  


***

  
  


The hotel is five miles down the road and smells like cigarette smoke and broken marriages. Geralt knows this because it was the first thing Jaskier said as they unlocked the door to the only room not being fumigated.

It’s not the same, but Geralt thinks that Destiny has a cruel sense of nostalgia.

“You look like you haven’t slept in weeks.” Jaskier notes as Geralt sets his bag at the end of one of the double beds.

Geralt ‘hms’ softly as he digs around for clean clothes and his own oils and soaps. He highly doubts anyone should use the hotels pre-packaged toiletries.

Jaskier chats happily with Roach as Geralt retreats to the bathroom to wash off the mud and rain and vampire grime. He hears them still even as he stands under a rush of lukewarm water. Roach lets out soft yips and Jaskier responds with grand tales of bar fights and lovely bartenders and a life free from monsters.

“What are you doing?” Geralt asks the shower wall.

Didn’t he already subject Jaskier to a lifetime fraught with danger at every turn? Didn’t he learn the first time that Jaskier is  _ human _ and humans wither and die? Could he really do it all over again?

Geralt tries to remember the day Jaskier died. How he felt. How he ached for  _ years _ .

How it still aches even with a new him in the next room.

By the time he’s emerged from the shower, the curtains have been drawn closed across the windows. Only a sliver of daylight leaks from the edges, reminding Geralt that for now, they are safe.

Roach has taken up a spot at the end of Jaskier’s chosen bed. Two cellphones sit charging on the table between them and his swords are propped up against it. Both dog and human are snoring away, tucked tight under garish orange blankets.

Geralt sinks into the edge of his bed.

He rubs his hands over his face with a tired sigh and tries to reign in the tight, horrible feeling inside his chest.

It doesn’t help. He needs sleep. He needs to  _ escape _ before the musician wakes. He did it dozens of times in the past. Surely he can do it again and stay as far away from Jaskier’s path as possible.

“You look older.”

Geralt jerks his head out of his hands at the sound of Jaskier’s voice.

His eyelids are heavy, face lax as though waking from a dream.

“Do I?” Geralt murmurs.

“Wrinkles.” A slow smile and his finger traces a wavy pattern across the bed sheet.

“I still age, just not the same.” Geralt longs to reach out to him, but he curls his hands over his knees instead.

Jaskier’s hand turns palm up, fingertips stretching out towards Geralt, “Take me with you, Geralt.”

“No.” Geralt hisses between clenched teeth, “You don’t know what you’re asking. You don’t  _ know _ .”

“Please.” His fingers curls inward, empty without Geralt’s own between them.

“I won’t do this again.” Geralt says, “You’re not the same. You’re just -.”

“Another thing life should take off your hands?”

“That’s not fair, Julian.” Geralt croaks and the words are an echo. A reminder of what he almost lost.

Jaskier does not reply as he succumbs to sleep once more.

Geralt does not sleep at all.

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I like to think that every new body that Roach inhabits welcomes her previous lives with open arms because they all instinctively know what a hopeless case Geralt is.


End file.
